GEOG 300: Carbon Footprint Assignment

The Carbon Footprint Calculator will allow you to get an idea of how “costly” your current lifestyle is. For this assignment, you’ll run two "calculations” – one as a person living in the United States and another as a person living in another country. Make sure you enter the same values when you run both calculators – in other words, you want to see the results of someone with essentially the exact same lifestyle as you but living in another country. Work your way through it, taking some notes as you move along, so you can use this material when you write the final report. This is highly generalized Carbon Calculator, but it was the first one generated and it is very simple and straight forward.

Some of the questions asked to calculate the results will not apply to students living in dorms. However, not currently staying in a house or apartment does NOT exempt you from this assignment. Call Mom, call Uncle Eddie, your significant other, etc., to get the information you’ll need to complete this assignment.

Instructions

  1. Go to this website:
  2. Select your location (USA) and answer all the questions asked. [*IMPORTANT* Use the second option, the one where you provide more detailed information.]
  3. When you are done, start over, this time selecting another location. Make sure you answer the questions exactly as you did on the first run (this time, the option for detailed information might not be available, but that’s okay!).

Final Write Up

Answer the following questions to generate a write up of 250-350 words. Don’t just answer the questions in place, write cohesive and short paragraphs to “report” your findings, using the following format:

Paragraph 1:

∙How many planets does it take to sustain your current lifestyle in the United States?

∙Do you feel that this number is accurate or do you think it's a bit exaggerated? Why do you think that?

∙What was the second location you selected? And why did you pick this location?

∙How many planets would it take to sustain your current lifestyle there?

Paragraph 2:

∙Is the number on the second calculation very different from the first round? Why do you think this is? (You might want to do a bit of research to find out why your results came out the way they did.)Feel free to add any other comments you want to make about your results

∙Finally, Click Here for a nice list of things you can do to reduce your footprint. It's ostensibly for Canadians, but CO2 weighs the same everywhere. Make a list of things that you can reasonably do to reduce your CO2 footprint by 2 tons. What are these actions??

Feel free to add any other comments you want to make about your results.

Submitting this assignment: Bring a hard copy of your write-up to your first recitation. Title it"Carbon Footprint Exercise."At the top of the page, include: 1) your first and last name, 2) the date, 3) the day and time of your recitation, and 4) your T.A. name (if you don’t know this, write it in class).